Unveiling the Hidden Depths: A Scene-by-Scene Journey into “Hell or High Water”

Here is my take on this exercise from a previous series of posts — How To Read A Screenplay:

After a first pass, it’s time to crack open the script for a deeper analysis and you can do that by creating a scene-by-scene breakdown. It is precisely what it sounds like: A list of all the scenes in the script accompanied by a brief description of the events that transpire.

For purposes of this exercise, I have a slightly different take on scene. Here I am looking not just for individual scenes per se, but a scene or set of scenes that comprise one event or a continuous piece of action. Admittedly this is subjective and there is no right or wrong, the point is simply to break down the script into a series of parts which you then can use dig into the script’s structure and themes.

The value of this exercise:

• We pare down the story to its most constituent parts: Scenes.
• By doing this, we consciously explore the structure of the narrative.
• A scene-by-scene breakdown creates a foundation for even deeper analysis of the story.

Today: Hell or High Water (2016). You may download a copy of the script here.

Written by Taylor Sheridan.

IMDb plot summary: A divorced father and his ex-con older brother resort to a desperate scheme in order to save their family’s ranch in West Texas.

Hell or High Water
Scene-By-Scene Breakdown
by Andrew Lightfoot
GoIntoTheStory.blcklst.com

P 1–4. It’s opening time for a First Texas Bank branch in Archer City Texas. The second one of the bank’s employees opens the door two robbers barge in. They demand the money that is in the drawers, but to their dismay they are empty. At gunpoint, the employee tells the two that the money is locked in the safe and the man who has the key for it will arrive here at 8:30. When 8:30 hits the man arrives. The second he waltzes into the bank he has a pistol placed to his temple.

P 4–6. The two robbers, brothers Tanner and Toby Hanson, now make their getaway from the bank in a 1988 Chevy Camaro. As they flee, they spot a sheriff’s cruiser flying towards them. Toby, being the more anxious of the two tells his brother…

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